July 2020 Meditation

A daily practice that has emerged for me over the years is to post an inspirational quotation and photo of nature each day on the Devadana Sanctuary Facebook page and also on the Devadana Sanctuary side of my Portal to Multidimensional Living, www.portaltomdl.com. As a result of this practice, I have found myself looking through thousands of photographs of this amazing planet each and every morning. More than once, I have found myself moved to tears by the stunning beauty and creativity of nature and have found that this has become a powerful and sacred morning practice.

One of the things I have noticed over these years is how much more aware I am of the intricacies, creativity, and stunning diversity that are part of Nature’s Intelligence. I capitalize those words because I think of Nature as a living Intelligence, one that informs and lives in, through, and as each and every one of us.

Sitting in my living room on a Sunday morning, I’m filled with the gift of silence. No city noises disturb the quiet this morning and that is a great gift. It has gotten me to thinking about the brain research I’ve mentioned before that reflects the benefits of silence in fundamental and literal ways. 

One of the benefits of having quiet time, time spent in silence, is that we gain access to our default mode network. This is the aspect of brain activity where we allow our minds to wander, to think deeply, to listen to our internal experience. All it requires is for us to move away from distractions and give ourselves quiet time to simply be present to our awareness.

Another reason to seek out times of silence is that research has shown that two hours of silence daily can lead “…to the development of new cells in the hippocampus, a key brain region associated with learning, memory and emotion.” In addition to this, we know that noise pollution raises blood pressure and creates stress for both body and mind. According to researchers,  “Just as too much noise can cause stress and tension, research has found that silence has the opposite effect, releasing tension in the brain and body.” These findings were reported in the Huffington Post by Carolyn Gregoire and shared by Daily Good a while back.